Field
The described embodiments relate to techniques for reducing power consumption of electronic devices in a wireless network.
Related Art
Many modern electronic devices include a networking subsystem that is used to wirelessly communicate with other electronic devices. For example, these electronic devices can include a networking subsystem with a cellular network interface (UMTS, LTE, etc.), a wireless local area network interface (e.g., a wireless network such as described in the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.11 communication protocol or Bluetooth™ from the Bluetooth Special Interests Group of Kirkland, Wash.), and/or another type of wireless interface.
When there are multiple electronic devices wirelessly communicating with each other in wireless local area network (WLAN), an electronic device may receive multiple packets that have a different destination than the electronic device (i.e., which are not relevant to the electronic device). However, in order to determine the destination of a packet, the networking subsystem typically decodes the entire packet.
For example, in the IEEE 802.11n communication protocol, the destination of the packet is specified by the machine-access-code (MAC) address in the payload after the preamble. Therefore, in order to determine the destination of the packet in this example, the networking subsystem typically needs to decode the packet all the way through to the error-detection information (in a so-called CRCd field), so that the networking subsystem can confirm that the destination has been decoded correctly.
Because this decoding effort occurs even when the packet has a different destination, significant power may be needlessly consumed by the networking subsystem. This power consumption reduces the operating time of the electronic device, which can frustrate users and degrade the user experience.